Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a plastic meter housing, in particular for a fluid meter, containing a bowl-like body having a base and a thereto adjoining annular wall having hollow connection pieces integrally formed thereon and leading into the interior of the body.
Meters are mostly used to register the flow of a liquid, for instance water, in order to determine a corresponding consumption. A meter usually consists of a meter housing, which is bowl-like in terms of its basic shape. Inserted in the meter housing is a measuring capsule, which has the actual components which are relevant to the measurement. For the insertion of the meter, on the meter housing there are provided corresponding connection pieces, which project therefrom and lead as hollow connection pieces into the interior of the housing, so that the fluid to be measured can flow in and out. The basic construction of such a meter is well known.
Such a meter housing is usually produced from brass, this by virtue of the fact that brass can be easily worked, exhibits no corrosion and is sufficiently stable. However, the relatively high weight of the metal meter housing is disadvantageous. Alternatively to a metal brass housing, it is also known to produce the meter housing from plastic. Such a meter housing is lighter in weight. Problems can arise in terms of stability, however, since the plastics material has a significantly lower compressive and tensile strength than brass. That is to say that the plastics material has a tendency to deform under pressure. Such compressive loads are also given, of course, in meter housings, since the fluid to be measured flows with sufficient pressure through the meter housing, or a corresponding nominal pressure in the region of several bars obtains. Furthermore, in the designing of the meter housing, allowance must also be made for corresponding overload pressures or extreme pressures, and hence for pressure peaks, which generally correspond to a multiple of the nominal pressure. For this reason, it is necessary to choose the wall thickness of the housing very large, since any deformation, in particular a mutual displacement of the connection pieces in one of the three spatial directions, must be avoided. This makes the housing, on the one hand, bulky, while, on the other hand, also relatively heavy again, so that, in the final analysis, advantages are barely given compared with the brass version.